What the Beekeeper Saw
by hophophop
Summary: "What are bees doing in here?" "Buzzing."
1. Ch 1: Examining the Hives

_"What are bees doing in here?"_  
_"Buzzing."_

* * *

I was used to getting messages from people unsure whether they should be contacting me at all. Before it was legal to keep bees in New York City, people would mumble into my voice mail, apparently afraid the bee vice squad set up stings, so to speak, to entrap those determined to flout the law. In fact, the NYPD generally had other things to do with their time, so it usually took a few determined neighbors intent on getting rid of a hive before the keeper would get a form letter in the mail to remove the bees by such a date or pay a fine and a removal fee.

Other folks were vague out of sheer cluelessness. They'd skimmed a sidebar in _Martha Stewart Living_ or _O_ with a bucolic image of meadows and Mason jars of golden honey, or they read Michael Pollen over their Whole-Foods-packaged lunches, or, less frequently, they just wanted pets they thought they wouldn't have to feed. Most of these were easily deterred when it became clear they had no place to put a hive. It was funny how many people put no thought into it whatsoever and simply imagined a bee hive to be comparable to an ant farm. I actually had a couple of websites for ant farm kits that I routinely passed along to these callers.

This time Uncle Ed relayed the message, saying he knew someone from work with some hives in Brooklyn who had to be out of town unexpectedly and could I take them on for a while.

"He wants them to stay on his roof, but he'll be away for several months," he said. "You can let me know what else you need to know to decide. He doesn't have email right now."

We were sitting at the diner counter waiting for breakfast, our usual saturday morning thing. I looked at him sidelong. I knew where he worked and had my suspicions about just how far "out of town" this guy might be. "He's got hives already set up? And you think I can trust him to pay me for, what, four months? six?"

"He's had the bees almost a year, kept them himself, he said. He saw me on the grounds with the smoker and came to talk. I think he's serious about it; he seemed concerned about leaving them, and he seemed to know his way around the equipment. And he offered to pay for six months in advance."

"What did you tell him about me?"

"I said my sister's kid had a beekeeping business in Brooklyn." I made a face at "kid" and he ignored me. "He asked about your experience; I told him you had an agriculture degree and references and a website. He asked which university and how long you'd been working with bees. That's it."

I could use the work, if it was the right situation. "Well, get me an address and a key, and I'll take a look."

* * *

It's always a little odd, entering somebody else's home when they're not there. I usually feel a little embarrassed and a little relieved. The first because there's nobody there to welcome me so I feel I don't really belong; the second because I don't have to worry about the kind of impression I'm making, either of myself or of what I think about their place. Some people are really attached to what you think of their home.

This house was enormous. The entire brownstone. I'd never visited one that hadn't been divided into apartments before. It was kind of run-down and haphazardly furnished, some rooms almost empty and others filled with shelves and tables covered by folders and books and other things. I saw a microscope, some scientific electronics, several skeleton parts, and a large mesh panel covered with padlocks. That might have been some kind of art piece, you never know. Not the usual knick knacks, anyway. Interesting, but unusual. Everything was turned off, and the house was quiet. I felt a little uneasy, but not as bad as I feared, given the circumstances. Not that I knew anything about that besides what I could imagine. Healthy, happy people didn't end up where Uncle Ed worked. The house smelled a little musty inside but otherwise clean. Somebody must have taken out the garbage after he left, cleared the fridge. I didn't realize I'd been dreading that smell until I noticed it wasn't there.

I remembered the time when I was in ninth grade and I was supposed to feed Uncle Ed's cats when he and Thomas were out of town, only when I got there Dan was there. He didn't live with them, and anyway I thought he would have gone on vacation with Uncle Ed and Thomas, like they'd done before. And he didn't seem right. He let me in, and the cats were fine, normal. But there was fast food trash all over the kitchen table and some cans and bottles scattered around the living room. It never looked like that when Uncle Ed was home. He asked me about school, also normal, but he seemed distracted, not really listening to my answers. He said he'd be there the rest of the weekend, no need for me to stop by, just a change of plans and they'd forgotten to let me know, no need for me to call Ed about it. And I left and didn't tell anybody. Nothing really to tell. The house didn't smell right, Dan didn't look right, and Little Ed's over-reacting. They broke up a while after that. So I was glad not to have the same feeling in Mr. Holmes's house, even though I guess it made me think of Dan anyway.

When I got up to the brownstone's roof I didn't recognize the hives at first. I'd never seen anything like them outside of a science museum. Honey-colored wood, glass sides, stacked taller than me. At the Brooklyn Bee Co-op folks had been creative with the hives, painting them with different designs and colors; some of the art was great, but it was still farm equipment: utilitarian first, decorative second. These hives were elegant but also inefficient. It would be easy to watch the bees but awkward to get at the combs.

I remembered the microscope and the other science stuff inside; maybe Mr. Holmes was an entomologist? Uncle Ed might know more. In any case, it wouldn't be time to harvest anything for a while, and the hives appeared to be doing well. There were no planters up there, but some of the surrounding rooftops had gardens, and I could see that the hive boxes had hardware for hanging feeders. I think bees do better feeding from flowers but at least they wouldn't starve. And maybe Mr. Holmes would be amenable to suggestions for improvement.

* * *

I finally met Mr. Holmes in person a couple of weeks after he got home. He said he wanted to know more about the adjustments I'd made to his set-up and to return some supplies I'd brought over that he'd been able to replace since being back. When he proposed meeting at 7:30am, I was a little surprised as that rarely happens with clients; most of the time we're meeting on weekends or after 6pm when it's still light out that late. But I'm always up early, so I agreed.

We'd been exchanging email about the bees for a little while, by that point. The first message I received from him was one of ten he sent in a single afternoon; first day back, I guessed.

I know going by "Ed" is problematic and people don't like it when they make assumptions that turn out to be wrong, so in my email I have my full name appear in the From: field to try to head off people's expectations: Lilah Edson Bere. I don't like "Lilah" and always sign off just as "Ed". It's a surprisingly good test of whether or not someone pays attention to detail, how quickly they notice or whether they're surprised when we meet in person. Mr. Holmes, in his quaintly formal way, had addressed me as Mr. Bere in his first email. I was Miss in the next.

I was expecting an academic type, grey hair, retired, maybe. Actually I think he even said that in one of the messages when I'd asked how he came to have bees; that the apiary was a project he decided to take up in retirement. And he was even working on some book. In any case, the person who opened the door that morning did not come close to what I'd pictured (and really, I should have known better), but suddenly some of the quirky items in the house made a bit more sense.

As we started up the first flight of stairs, Mr. Holmes shouted "Watson!" loud enough to make me jump. I heard a faint exclamation from the floor above. When we got to the landing, one of the doors opened and a groggy woman with dark disheveled hair appeared, startled to see me and clutching a long baggy cardigan closed over the t-shirt and shorts she'd obviously just been sleeping in. Mr. Holmes stopped, and I set down my toolbox.

"This is my interim lodger, Miss Watson. Watson, Ed Bere, apiculturist. If you need, ah, anything from me, we shall be examining the hives."

Miss Watson did not appear to be a morning person, but her scowl was for Mr. Holmes, not me.

"Epi-what?" Her voice was gravelly and she sounded impatient. "Never mind. It's too early, I need tea." She turned deliberately to me. "Hello. I'm Joan. Did he offer you any? Um coffee? Or tea? Would you like some?"

He started to respond but her raised hand cut him off as she kept her attention on me.

"Ah no, thanks. I'm good," I said, and he immediately began moving off to the next flight of stairs without waiting to see if I followed.

"Right," she said, looking to see where he was going. "Oh! _Api_- not epi-. You're off to the bees." She eyed Mr. Holmes with some suspicion and went back into her room muttering, "I hope that's not a euphemism."

I thought she seemed a little presumptive, even bossy, for a "lodger"; to be honest the exchange reminded me of how my brother and I goaded each other when we were teens, disregarding everyone else around us. Maybe lodger has a different connotation in England. I picked up my kit and hurried to catch up to Mr. Holmes.


	2. Ch 2: Flight Paths of Displaced Bees

_"A bee in a box, yes it is."_

* * *

I saw Mr. Holmes and Miss Watson again a week later at the monthly meeting of the New York City Apiculturists Society. Or rather I heard them first, when they sat down in the row of seats behind me.

"Why didn't you tell me we were going to a lecture on bees? I would have brought my book." She sounded exasperated.

"As you continually admonish me when we attend your dreary events, you might learn something valuable if you try paying attention. However, unlike you I have no qualms about your practicing self-hypnosis instead. You might consider repeating the word 'perfunctory' which means—"

"I know what perfunctory means."

" —or 'meddlesome' although I find a four-syllable word to be more effective."

"I am not going to put myself into a trance."

"As you like. I'm not confident that the speaker's credentials are sufficient to have prepared him for the scope of the topic, but I've been in contact with his PhD advisor for my book, and she is first-rate. I anticipate an adequate, if not erudite presentation."

She sighed.

* * *

During the break after the talk, Miss Watson came up to me as I waited in line for coffee.

"Hi, I'm Joan, we met last week? It's Ed, right?" I nodded to let her know I remembered her. "It's nice to see someone here I recognize."

"Hello; yes, at Mr. Holmes's house. This is your first time at one of these?"

"Yes. I'm not really into bees." She laughed, a little embarrassed. "Sorry, no offense. I'm not _not_ into them, if you know what I mean. But I just tagged along with Sherlock tonight. I was curious to learn something about my thousands of housemates."

We reached the coffee urns at that point and and focused on filling cups and stirring things and moving out of the way of the rest of the crowd. I felt a little shy with her, not knowing what to say if bees weren't going to be the topic of conversation. Luckily, she seemed to be one of those people who can handle situations where small talk is expected and make it actually mean something.

"I think it's great that urban farming and people keeping chickens and bees in the city is taking off in New York. You work fulltime as a beekeeper here?" I nodded. "I love that. If you don't mind my asking, how did you get started? Sorry if that's too nosy; Sherlock's constant quest for information may be rubbing off on me a little."

I nodded again. "That's OK. My uncle, actually. He's a gardener and has had a bee hobby for years. As long as I can remember. I used to tag along with him in the summers when I was a kid, and the place where he works has acres of grounds with an apiary..." I trailed off because she was suddenly staring at me intently, as if I had posed a problem she wasn't expecting. It was a little disconcerting.

"Sorry, you said your uncle is a gardener and works with bees at his job? Ed... That's not short for Edson, is it?"

She looked as surprised as I felt. "Uh, yeah, my uncle's name is Edson. Well it's his last name, and my middle name, and I like it better than my first, so..." I was rambling. "How...?"

Her surprise flipped then, just like a light switch, to a bright smile. "I think I actually met him a few days after I met you. I had a meeting there. Where he works. And then I saw him with a smoke thing at a tree, and I went over to ask him about it. Since I live with bees at the moment." She paused and looked down at her cup for a moment, then looked back at me again. "I can see the resemblance now. Small world!"

Her smile was calmer now, and I felt I could watch her connect the dots between me and Uncle Ed and Mr. Holmes and what I might know or not know about where Mr. Holmes was for six months. Which of course I don't really know, not officially. And I didn't know what she knew. If she had a meeting there, she must be a doctor or a family member of someone staying there. Or maybe she was a patient. Maybe that's how they knew each other. There was no way for me to know.

"Yeah! Small world." I didn't know what else to say.

"Your uncle was very generous with his time that day; I enjoyed talking with him. Please pass on my greetings the next time you see him."

"I will." I wondered what he'd say about meeting her.

Mr. Holmes came up to us then, and people were starting to return to the chairs for the business half of the meeting. He nodded a greeting to me. "Good to see you're occupying yourself productively, Watson. Ms Bere here is quite the local apiculture expert."

"Yes; she was just telling me how she came to be a beekeeper." She took a breath then, her face now almost wary as she looked at him. There was a long pause while he focused on his phone, rapidly typing out a text or email. "I hadn't realized she was related to Edson," she said quietly.

His head whipped up to stare at her. I actually took half a step back from the force of his reaction; he seemed almost angry. "We have to go," he said. "Text from Captain Gregson." He turned abruptly and walked off quickly toward the coat racks. I looked back to Miss Watson, wondering if I'd inadvertently crossed one of those lines connecting our mutual dots I wasn't meant to cross. She made a rueful face.

"I'm sorry about that, Ed. You probably know he can get a little intense sometimes." She shook her head. Like that morning we met, she seemed more focused on him than on me, and I relaxed a little. "You know he does consulting for the police? That was about a new case. He tends to push everything else aside. Including politeness." She held out her hand, and I gave it a quick shake. She smiled again, a little sad now, and I thought she might have guessed I could tell she was covering for him. "It was very nice to chat with you. I hope I'll see you again soon."

She walked over to where he stood by the door, tense and jittery like a hive under attack, her coat gripped in his outstretched hand until she took it from him. His shoulders were hunched and his hands flexing with agitation but he stayed by her side as they walked down the hallway to the exit.

* * *

A while after Hurricane Sandy, I got an email from Mr. Holmes asking for my advice on whether he should consider bringing his hives indoors for the winter. He said Miss Watson was moving out soon and he thought he could use her room for the apiary. I wondered if something had happened; I'd been over there just after Sandy to help with a swarm, and I didn't get any sense that she was on the verge of leaving.

When I was there for the swarm, Miss Watson asked if I had any suggestions for stopping honey from dripping inside. When I explained that the honey in the house was almost certainly not from the hive boxes, which were as pristine as if they actually were installed in a science museum, but rather a colony somewhere in the building, Mr. Holmes got very excited. There had been another swarm last year, he said, but he hadn't seen where they went.

He seemed to love the idea of bees living freely inside the walls, but she suggested rather firmly that leaving them there was not a good idea. It was the opinion of someone invested in the place, it seemed to me in retrospect, not of someone about to leave. I pointed out that honey might attract other wildlife, and he conceded, almost comically reluctant and quite opposite from her reaction.

"By 'wildlife' you mean vermin," she said. I nodded. He responded to her with a rant about irrational social constructions on the value and purpose of non-human species. "I have no problems socially constructing rats as undesirable tenants," she said. He mumbled something about losing a unique experimental opportunity. She asked when we could start removing the bees.

"I'll need to get another hive box for them; I only brought the one for the swarm. I can probably borrow one from the Bee Co-op," I said.

"They were hit hard by Sandy, weren't they?" she asked. "I read an article about it. Most of the hives were destroyed by flooding?"

"Yes. We were able to move them above the projected flood zone, but the surge was higher, and then some got trapped under debris. We'll have to start over."

"I didn't realize you were involved with the co-op," she said. "Do you have to wait until the spring to start, or are you getting new bees already?"

"A few actually returned on their own, but we'll be doing both. Some other apiaries in the northeast have offered to donate. We want to breed bees specifically suited to this climate, so it's a little more difficult than just ordering new stock from anywhere."

We were out on the roof, Miss Watson, me, and the swarm in their new temporary home. She had sent Mr. Holmes to the kitchen to bring us some hot cider she had started simmering on the stove before I arrived. "One of my favourite fall treats, drinking hot cider outside on a cool day," she said to me. "Especially when someone else is going to walk up and down four flights of stairs to get it." A few minutes later he came out from inside, carrying a tray with large thermos and some cups.

She took the tray from him and started pouring out the cider. It smelled like cinnamon. It's one of my favourite things about fall, too. We all stood quietly for a minute, all of us cupping our mugs with two hands.

"What did you have planned for these," she asked him, indicating the new hive with her foot.

"I didn't have anything planned," he said. "Swarms are unpredictable by definition. I suppose I could order more hives."

"What about giving them to Ed? For the Bee Co-op. They lost everything in the storm."

He looked over at me. "Certainly. If you can use the bees, by all means take them where they are needed. Setting up a new colony now is really the last thing I should be taking on. And I'm not looking to start a honey business. Although Watson, if you want to consider a new career..."

She laughed at him, shaking her head, and offered me a refill. I thanked them both; the bees were his, but she made the offer to share them.

He and I tracked down the colony that was living in the walls. It took some effort, but eventually I smoked them out and he donated those bees to the Co-op too.

* * *

**Note:** I made up the Brooklyn Bee Co-op but I've based it on what I know about the Brooklyn Grange (which is an amazing urban agriculture project), which did lose their apiary in Hurricane Sandy.  
Read more at brooklyngrangefarm dotcom [slash] hurricanebees

My beekeeping knowledge is at the level of the clueless folks who contact Ed after reading about it in some glossy magazine, supplemented by wikipedia and other beekeeping sites. Apologies to actual apiculturalists.


	3. Ch 3: Nesting Habits of Solitary Bees

_"I take it beekeeping is a hobby?_

* * *

Most native bee species are solitary, males and females meeting to mate before going their separate ways, the males to die and the females to lay a few single eggs in nests provisioned with pollen and nectar. Some species cooperate to build and guard communal nests in which each individual goes its solitary way.

These bees are important pollinators, visiting many plants in the process of setting up each nest. It's not possible for humans to harness their work for the production of honey and wax, and there are no colonies or hives we can collect, organize, and mobilize the way we do with the social bee species to cart them across agricultural regions to pollinate different crops. Although solitary bees appear to be more resilient to the constellation of threats that has resulted in colony collapse disorder for social bees, they are at risk from habitat loss. We are at risk from their loss.

* * *

A week after replying to the email from Mr. Holmes about moving his hives indoors, I still hadn't heard back from him. Since my reply was essentially "It depends," I expected him to suggest we get together to talk about it or at least ask for clarification with more questions. It's tricky, sometimes, finding the line between helpful availability and obnoxious desperation when following up with clients. It wasn't winter yet, so I decided to give him another week before emailing him again.

I saw Miss Watson at the farmers' market that weekend. It was early, around 8am, when it's still easy to walk past the stalls without a crush of people clogging the aisles. By 9:30, it's impassable with shoppers and strollers and dogs (and sometimes toddlers) on leashes tangling up everywhere. I wondered if she'd moved yet; if so, it must have been nearby, or she'd be at some other market this morning.

I walked over to the vegetable stand where she was looking at some winter squash.

"Hi, Miss Watson," I said.

"Hi Ed — please, it's Joan. How are you? How's the bee business this time of year?" She passed three squashes over to be weighed and was waiting to pay for them. She picked the delicata, pale yellow oblongs with dark green stripes. My favorite variety, actually.

"Oh, it's a quieter time for beekeeping outdoors. But there's honey and wax processing, to sell. And repairs, still, at the co-op. And some winterizing for hives staying outside."

When she finished paying for the squash she turned back to me, and I blurted out, "Did you move?"

She looked at me with some surprise, and I continued, feeling a little embarrassed, "Mr. Holmes emailed me last week to ask about moving his bees indoors and mentioned using your room once you had left. But I haven't heard back since I replied..."

"Oh." She breathed in sharply and turned away for a minute, looking out across the tables and tents of the market, which was getting steadily more crowded and noisy. With her face turned away I could barely hear her. "I didn't know he was serious about that. He's always saying things. And you never quite know which might turn out to be hypothetical scenarios and which are actual plans."

If I knew her better — longer than six weeks, anyway — if we were friends, I would have asked her what was wrong. Instead, I just waited and said nothing.

She let out another breath and looked back at me, no sign of concern or strain on her face. Well, maybe a little strain; her eyes looked tired. "I was planning to move last week, but my plans changed, so I'll be there a while longer yet. And I guess the bees won't be joining me." Another pause as she adjusted the handles of the canvas bag on her shoulder now heavy with squash.

"Wait, that's not a problem is it? Do the bees need to be moved indoors to survive?" She was concerned now, even upset.

"No," I said quickly. "They did all right up there last winter; he said he didn't bring them in then."

"Oh good. He'd hate to lose the bees."

She looked like she was going to say more, and I imagined she added "too", like "he'd hate to lose the bees, too," but she didn't say that. I don't know what else he had to lose. I don't know why I imagined that's what she was going to say.

"Some will die, but that's normal," I said when she didn't continue. "We can insulate the hives. Most people in the city don't have the option to bring them indoors, and it's not usually cold enough here to kill the whole colony," I said. "In his message, he said it would be an experiment for his book."

"Ah. Okay. He's been sick this week. I don't know if he's thought about the bees since— That must be why he didn't get back to you."

"He does usually respond right away, so I thought maybe he didn't get my reply. I've heard the flu is bad this year; I'm sorry to hear he's sick. There's no rush to decide about the bees; either way, he should probably do something in the next couple of weeks."

"I hope I'll know what I'm doing by then," she said.

As I wandered around the market after we parted, I wondered about what she'd said. That he'd been sick. I wondered if that's all it was. I couldn't help but speculate, with the shadow of Hemdale in the background. If Uncle Ed hadn't referred me to Mr. Holmes, there was nothing in my experience with him that would have led me to imagine drugs. Maybe that wasn't even what it was, why he was there. It shouldn't be the first thing I thought of; that wasn't fair to him.

Miss Watson — Joan, I pushed myself to think, trying it out — seemed so on edge this morning. Almost fragile, although thinking back, there was only a moment or two I could pinpoint where she didn't seem as she had the other times, friendly and calm and self-assured. But working with bees, I've come to develop some confidence in my ability to read non-verbal communication. There's nothing else to go by, with them. I'm usually right about the emotional states of folks around me. Joan was unhappy about something, and Mr. Holmes having the flu didn't fit as a reason. Whatever it was, I hoped they'd both be all right.

* * *

I've always been close to Uncle Ed. He and I seemed to be the only introverts for three generations: my mom (his sister) and their parents; their brother and his family; my brother and his. Even Thomas, Uncle Ed's partner. We're also the only ones who don't have kids. I've been meeting Uncle Ed for lunch on saturdays for years. We're both comfortable sitting and eating in silence, although we usually find things to talk about. Sometimes antics of other family members (and with all those extroverts, there are plenty of antics), sometimes beekeeping. He was really supportive of me starting my business.

I saw him the saturday after I talked with Miss Watson at the NYCAS lecture.

"Hey, I met someone who knows you," I said after we'd sat down.

"Hmm?" He was reading the menu, like it wasn't something he'd looked at a thousand times before. He always did that.

"Miss Watson. Joan Watson."

He looked up at me, obviously not placing the name.

"She knows Mr. Holmes? Said she met you last week and asked me to thank you for talking to her."

"Oh." He looked at me like he wasn't sure if I had done something I wasn't supposed to do. "Yes, I remember her. Didn't recall her name when you said it. How did all this come up?"

"She lives at Mr. Holmes's house—"

His eyebrows went up in surprise. "She what? They live together?"

"No, not like that. At least, I don't think so. Didn't seem like it. The first time I went over there after he, um, got back from out of town?" He frowned at me but didn't comment. "That's what you told me. Anyway, she was living there then, and he introduced her as his tenant. Then the next week, they both were at the NYCAS lecture. She didn't know anybody else there and was talking to me at the break and asked how I started beekeeping. So then I mentioned you and she figured out she'd met you the week before."

"How did she figure that out? What did you say?"

"It was the beekeeping and the name. Not too many Eds, these days, I guess."

"Did she say what we talked about?"

"No. Just that she asked you about bees because Mr. Holmes had some. Why? What did you talk about?"

"And she came to the lecture. With him."

"Yes, they came together, that's what she said. And I saw them leave together too." I didn't get why he was stuck on this.

He'd been holding his menu up this whole time, and he folded it shut and set it down on the table. "Okay then. How was the lecture?"

"Uncle Ed!"

"Little Ed!" he said, mimicking my tone. Which, I admit, was rather whiny.

"Don't call me that. How do you know Miss Watson?"

"She told you: she saw me working the smoker on a wild hive and came over to ask about it."

"And that's it, or that's all you're going to tell me?" I knew what his answer was going to be as soon as I said that. Infuriating.

"Yes," he said. I rolled my eyes and he shrugged.

He wasn't going to budge. And then the waitress came to get our order and I dropped the subject.

Since that conversation with my uncle, I've thought about Mr. Holmes and Miss Watson and what it means to "live together." They did seem close, to me, but not as a romantic couple. Why was hard to pinpoint. I knew she hadn't been living in the house before he got back; no one lived there during those six months I visited to care for the hives. If I had to guess, I would say they'd known each other a long time, but maybe this was the first time they were living in the same place.

Uncle Ed and Thomas have been together — living together — for over twenty years now. But it took me a long time to see that the series of roommates and friends who also shared their lives were something other than the roommates and friends I've had. I had figured it out by the time Dan left, and if I hadn't, the intensity of their anger and sadness over his drug problems might have clued me in. I am grateful to have had the chance to learn when I was young that love doesn't always fit neatly into the paired-off pink and blue "happily ever after" boxes we're so strongly encouraged to seek. Considering how different people are from each other, it only makes sense to expect a lot of different ways of relating and connecting and caring.

The longest time I ever spent with Mr Holmes and Joan was that afternoon I helped with the swarm. Their interactions then demonstrated a careful dance between formality and intimacy. There were no casual touches, no physical displays of affection in my presence. At the same time, there were moments of, I don't know, engagement? When one or the other would move into the other's personal space and it appeared comfortable, normal, for that moment. They frequently looked at each other but often separately, first one, then the other, not making eye contact. They reminded me of bees funneling in and out of the hive, each working independently while simultaneously fully participating in the shared activity, aware and coordinated in movement and response with very little direct acknowledgement.

Family. They behaved like family.

* * *

I did end up emailing Mr. Holmes to suggest we insulate the hives for the winter if he wasn't moving them indoors. This time he responded within minutes and apologized for not replying earlier, although he didn't offer any explanation. He said he'd taken care of the hives but suggested I stop by if it was convenient because "Watson has something for you."

When I got to the house, Joan answered the door and let me in.

"He's with the bees if you want to head up there," she said. "I'll be out in a bit."

Up on the roof it was cold and bright. Once my eyes adjusted after the dim light of the stairwell, I did a double-take when I saw the cut on Mr. Holmes's cheek and his fading black eye. I tried to pretend I wasn't staring but he waved me off.

"Had a little altercation on a case. Occupational hazard. Like bee stings."

It had never occurred to me that a consultant to the police might be interacting so, well, directly with cases. "Does this hazard come up often? I probably only get stung about ten times a year."

"That's about how often I've been stung, yes." I wasn't sure if he was talking about actual bee stings or not, but decided to leave it at that.

I went over to look at the hives. In winter in New York City, you want to reduce condensation inside the boxes and limit air flow to stabilize temperature while still allowing some ventilation. The glass sides on these hives make this something of a challenge, but they came with covers designed for that purpose, so I imagined they'd do well enough. "Looks good," I said. "I've never seen anything like it."

He came over and adjusted something on one side of the nearer box. After fussing with it for a minute, he turned to me. "I wanted to thank you for your help with the bees while I was away, and after," he said. "Please also tell your uncle that I'd like to thank him for referring you. I am in his debt."

"Oh. Of course." He sounded so serious and sincere, as if he worried I might not believe him. "Thank you for the opportunity. It's been great to see how these hives work; I didn't have experience with this design before." I paused, unsure whether to continue. Joan came out of the door then, so I did.

"Mr. Holmes was just thanking me," I said to her. "But I've really enjoyed working here. I'm glad I got to meet you both. And my uncle will be happy to know I didn't embarrass him."

Joan was looking at Mr. Holmes then, and he said, "I asked Miss Bere to pass on my thanks to Edson."

"Really," she said. "Good."

"Did you bring the coals to Newcastle?" he asked.

She smiled and handed him a small narrow package.

"They're not for me," he said, pushing her hand away. "Give it to Miss Bere."

She handed it to me, a little heavy for its size, wrapped in plain butcher paper. I knew exactly what it was and smiled back at them.

"I'm sure you must have them stacked in every cupboard," she said. "But Sherlock cleaned out the hives and got some wax and an ancient taper mold from god knows where. So we melted it up and made the candles."

"Thanks so much — I tend to work on the honey side of things. I've never actually made candles myself." I unwrapped the package carefully to look at them. Ten inches, a lovely golden color, with a simple vine pattern from the mold. They were beautiful. "This is lovely. What a wonderful design. You don't know where the mold came from?"

"It was in the box of beekeeping paraphernalia I brought here from England," Mr. Holmes said. "Who put what in there when, I can't say."

They were doing it again, each looking at the one who was speaking to me, perfectly in sync. They weren't at all like couples who make every other person feel like a third wheel. They weren't at all like a couple. And yet they were "they," not he and she.

I don't know how to describe it. Them. Not that it really matters what I think.

"Okay, Sherlock, it's freezing up here. Let's go inside. I'll make tea."

Mr. Holmes nodded to Joan and went ahead of her to open the door.

"After you, Watson." He held the door open for me as well and then followed us down the stairs. As we reached the second floor landing he asked, "Miss Bere, do you know anything about tortoises?"


End file.
